Lexicon

Abject
Accretion
Actant
Aeration
Aerobic
Algae-boosted
Animal
Anthropomorphism
Anti-Continuous Construction
Apocalypse
Aquaculture
Aquanaut
Ark
Artificial Intelligence
Autopoiesis
Assemblages
Asymmetry
Atrophy
Attraction
Autarchy
Automata
Automation
Autosymbiosis
Bambassador
Bathyscaphe
Bioconurbation
Biomedia
Bionics
Biosphere
Biotechnique
By-product
Capacity
Actant
Coisolation
Composting
Conservative Surgery
Consumer Envelope
Consumption
Continuous Construction
Conurbation
Correalism
Cultural_Memory
Cybernetics
Cybertecture
Cyborg
Dispositif
Diving Saucer
Dross
Earthship
Ecocatastrophe
Effluvium
Egosphere
End-use
Entanglement
Eutopia
Feedback
Foam
Folk
Gadget
Garbage House
Green Cyborg
Heuristic
Hoard
Holism
Homogenization of Desire
Hostile
Human Affect
Hybridized Folk
Hydroponic
Hyper-Materialism
Information Economy
Inner Space
Interama
Intra-Uterine
Maque
Megalopolis
Min-use
Mobility
Monorail
Multi-Hinge
Non-Design
Oceanaut
Oppositional Consciousness
Organic
Ouroboros
Panarchy
Parasite
Perceived Continuation
Permanence
Place
Prototype
Post-Animal
Reclamation
RI: Data Farms
RI: Garbage and Animals
RI:Shipbreaking
RI: Toxic Sublime
Sampling
Scale
Sensing Structure
Simulacrum
Simulation
Soft Energy
Spaceship Earth
Submersible
Superwindow
Symbiosis
Synthetic Environment
Technocratic
Technological Heredity
Technological Sublime
Telechirics
The Sublime
Thermal Panel
Actant
Thing-Power
Thinking Machines
Tool
Toxic Withdrawal
Turbulence
UV-Transparent Film
Vibrant Matter
Waste
Work

By-product

Martin Pawley discusses excess and consumerism in his writings on garbage housing in the 1970s. Pawley’s main goal was to raise awareness of consumerism and its negative consequences on the environment and society. He begins by alluding to the American home, annually increasing in average square-footage, as a container for a variety of things and appliances. The packaging and shipping of these appliances is often disposed of upon delivery. This diminishes our efforts towards establishing a sustainable society because the packaging and other materials are considered a non-desirable outcome based on the necessity of shipping it must therefore be discarded. Pawley suggests that this is also a common feeling toward public housing, which has for years been portrayed as the alternative and less honorable lifestyle for Americans. The depiction of public housing as a by-product rather than a solution to the homeless issue of the United States is failing to solve the issue, as many individuals remain without a shelter, yet the usage of building and packaging materials is at its highest in history. Martin Pawley discusses the possibility of developing packaging with dual uses, which span beyond the protection and containment of its contents. He stresses that advertisements must depict the multitude of uses in order to rethink of the packaging as more than just the necessary derivative of its contents. Consumers can reprioritize the usage of packaging and so its final function may exist in a number as possibilities, which will turn packaging from an abject of obsolescence into an object with purpose.

1. Martin Pawley, “Garbage Housing” in Architectural Design, Vol. 41, No. 2 (1971), pp. 86-95.
2. Martin Pawley, “Garbage Housing” in Architectural Design, Vol. 41, No. 2 (1971), pp. 86-95.